Gameplay info and modes

• Tag ins are much faster than they were in Marvel vs. Capcom 2, and are now overhead attacks (must be blocked high). You can't really combo after connecting with a tag in, but there may be some exceptions to this.

• As previously mentioned, tag ins are still performed by holding one of the Assist buttons.

• There will be a Trials (Challenges) mode in Marvel vs. Capcom 3, similar to the one that was in Super Street Fighter 4. While SSF4's trials were very difficult, MvC3's will be geared towards getting players familiar with the characters and preparing them to play against other people.

• The game no longer shows the amount of damage done in combos. The team wanted to keep MvC3 more like MvC2, and when they had the damage numbers in there, it just didn't feel right, so they took them out.

• The developers have expanded the ability to combo after throwing your opponent. This isn't overly easy to do, but it's more common now than it was before.

• Some of the cast members do not have levels 3 Supers right now, but they all have three different Supers. It's still being decided if everyone will get a Level 3 or not.

• There will be taunts in the game, every character has one so far. These are performed by pressing the Select button.

• Complete button configuration is available, like in every Capcom fighting game, so you can layout your buttons however you want. One of the defaults you can select is an MvC2-styled layout.

• The MvC3 character balancing process is handled by the Battle Director, primarily, but he also consults with Niitsuma-san and Capcom USA staff, including Seth Killian, to get input on balancing the game.

Characters and misc. details

• Some of the character models have been improved since you first saw them in-game. Characters like Dante and Deadpool were fairly far along when they were shown, but others have received numerous touch ups.

• Niitsuma said he doesn't like to deconfirm characters because he doesn't want to say that a character won't be in the game when they may end up being in there after all. Also, deconfirming characters could lead to knowing the roster through a process of elimination.

• Capcom never had plans to add in any Monster Hunter characters to MvC3. Marvel had some characters that were off the table from the very start, but this is a contract thing and Niitsuma couldn't elaborate on it.

• The original proposal from Capcom was to have Stan Lee in the game, but Marvel is handling that side of things, so Niitsuma wasn't sure if he'd show up.

Simple Mode

• Seth Killian very much emphasized that Simple Mode won't give an advantage to expert players. Balance was definitely a concern when they were creating this, so Capcom has designed it so that it cannot be abused by people who know what they're doing.

• An example Seth gave is that Dante has around 40 special moves, in Simple Mode he has access to 4 of them. Simple Mode only has one Super per character as well.

• Simple Mode will be available online. You might be able to block people who are using it though, but this hasn't been decided yet.

• One of the reasons Simple Mode was added to the game is that some fighters were difficult to play, so they added in a mode so even new players could jump in and try these characters out.

Future plans and next MvC3 Fight Club

• Capcom will have the next Fight Club at a location they've never hosted one at before. Seth is 90% sure that Wesker, Tron Bonne, Spider-man and X-23 will be playable there. This event will happen on October 28, 2010.

• Once the console versions of MvC3 are complete, they'll consider doing a arcade port of the game. Again, they're only going to consider it — it may not happen.

• They're looking into making a Collector's Edition for both the USA and Japan.

• A demo is still up in the air at this point.

X-Factor System

• Seth warned that the X-Factor system has been one of those things that is constantly changing, so keep in mind a lot of this stuff could be different by the time the game is released.

• When you activate X-Factor, the game takes into account how much life you have with your remaining player(s). It's more powerful if you use it when all of your other characters are dead, as the less life you have the longer it lasts.

• It cannot be activated while you're getting hit, which is unlike the Mega Crash system in Tatsunoko vs. Capcom.

• You can Cancel your own move with X-Factor, it returns you to a neutral state where you can pull off combos that wouldn't otherwise be possible. An example used was Canceling Iron Man's Proton Cannon Hyper and then going into another Proton Cannon Hyper.

• X-Factor works the same for all of the characters — there are no unique properties depending on who you activate it with.

Music and voices

• The 'Take You For a Ride' song is officially back.

• As previously mentioned, the dialogue the characters speak will change depending on the situation and which teammates you choose.

• Marvel characters will only have English voice actors, but users can select between Japanese and English voices for the Capcom fighters.

• An external team outside of Capcom is creating the music for this game. This team used to work on Capcom games, but is now their own outlet. The person in charge of X-23's song didn't work for Capcom, but was asked to do work for SSF4.

John Z also typed up these notes from Ryota Niitsuma.

One issue we couldn't finish our time with Niitsuma without addressing is one of balance - Marvel vs. Capcom 2 was scarily unbalanced, with only a handful of characters seeing any play at the top level, and although there's a focus on keeping this fun and accessible, the team seems to agree that it still needs to be balanced well.

"I don't think you can have too many characters. It's just a matter of budget and planning. I'd think something like 40 would be quite a lot," he muses, perhaps hinting at a final tally. Regardless, we assume he's heard the balancing question before, as his answers ready almost before we're done asking.

"It's been a decade since MvC2 so there have been millions of people playing hundreds of hours, which obviously exceeds any [quality assurance] team on the planet. But we have learned from it and researched other titles extensively. We think we've got all the important points in place, so hopefully when we release MvC3, it'll feel a lot more balanced than MvC2 was."